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Wednesday, December 4, 2013

The Importance of Unexceptionalism (Protector of the Small)

A while back I wrote about Alanna the Lionness from the Song of the Lionness quartet by Tamora
Pierce. I talked about how Alanna was an interesting character not only because
she became the first female knight in hundreds of years in her fictional home
country of Tortall, but also because she is so darned magical, and, well,
exceptional. She’s an intentional feminist figure, a woman breaking down the
barriers of sex, and she’s very very good at it.

But here’s the thing: I have never really felt like an
Alanna, personally. I don’t feel like I’m that one person in a million who will
prove the haters wrong once and for all. I’m not magical or extra-super-duper
special. Or, maybe I am, but it’s a quieter kind of special.

This is a common problem in narratives about women who
overcome great obstacles to break down gender boundaries. Or really in any
narrative about an exceptional person who battles prejudice to prove the haters
wrong. The point always comes when you have to think, “Well, yeah. But what
about everyone else who isn’t an exception?”

That’s where Pierce’s followup quartet, Protector of the Small comes in. The story follows Keladry of
Mindelan, the first female knight in Tortall after Alanna tricks her way through. She’s the first girl to openly
go into page training and seek her knighthood, and she’s kind of blissfully
ordinary. I mean, not completely, because that would be boring, but in
comparison to Alanna? She’s a veritable pigeon of normalcy.

Kel starts out the series as the person we all felt like at
age ten. Awkward in her own body, frustrated that her older siblings keep
playing jokes on her or telling her she’s too little. She’s spent the past six
years in the Yamani Islands (basically Japan) with her parents who are
ambassadors there, and as a result she has a foreign perspective on the world.
She doesn’t fit in. But she does know one thing: she wants to be a knight. Why?
Because when she’s a knight she can do the thing she wants most to do in the
world. She can protect the helpless.

I know that’s actually kind of a strange thing for a ten
year old to want, but it fits really well with her character. Kel is stubborn,
but endlessly compassionate. She really and truly cares about those around her,
which is both a good thing, because it makes her a great person, and a bad
thing, because it gets her in trouble.

The first book in the series, First Test, follows Kel as she arrives at the castle for her
training to begin. Because she’s the first girl to openly attempt page training
(Alanna was disguised as a boy until after she got her knighthood), Kel faces a
lot of discrimination.A lot. Even the training
master, Lord Wyldon, objects to having a girl there. Actually, Lord Wyldon
especially objects.

Wyldon demands that Kel undergo a probation year, something
unheard of. If she survives the year with no mistakes, and proves that she can
keep up with the boys and make a proper page, then she will be allowed to stay.
And since Lord Wyldon will be the one to judge her fitness, it doesn’t seem at
all set that she will, in fact, be allowed to keep on. Naturally everyone
objects, especially Alanna, who had hoped to be able to mentor Kel, but the
King uphold’s Wyldon’s decision. Because the old guard will have so much
trouble accepting Kel, they might as well prove her fitness early on, so that
no one can object.

And so it begins. Kel comes in with an axe over her head to
prove her worthiness, and she does. But she doesn’t do it through extraordinary
acts of courage or incredible skills. She does it because she’s a hard worker
and doesn’t complain. Because when one of the boys tries to play a trick on her
and gives her a lead weighted weapon, she decides that she might as well keep
it so that she can build her upper body strength. Because when Wyldon condemns her
for fighting in the halls, she continues on her quest to rid the castle of
bullying and other forms of injustice.

At the end of the year, it’s no surprise to anyone except
for Lord Wyldon and Kel herself that he allows her to stay. She’s earned it, by
being true to herself and working very, very hard. She saw the flaws she had –
like lacking upper body strength and being trained in a different sort of
archery – and sought to overcome them. In short, Kel wins over Lord Wyldon
precisely because while she’s good, she’s unexceptional. There is no
extenuating circumstance to explain her succees. She’s just tyring hard.

The second book, Page,
then follows Kel as she continues on this path through her next three years of
page training. She keeps on fighting bullies, hires a maid with a past of
sexual abuse and teaches her to fight while economically supporting her
business ventures, and collects a ragtag group of sparrows, dogs, and fellow
pages who will support her. At the end of the four years, when Kel is about to
take her final test to complete her page training, a rival in the court (who
hates her) kidnaps her maid. Kel doesn’t hesitate at all in going off to rescue
Lalasa, the maid, even though she knows that to do so is to forfeit her years
of training and possibly have to take them over again.

That singular action is pretty much what drives her through
graduation from page training, as no one can argue that Kel is unsuited to be a
knight after that. Her self-sacrifice even wins over Lord Wyldon at last, which
is impressive, and makes her known to a couple of benefactors, such as Lord
Raoul, head of the King’s Own.

Raoul decides to take Kel as his squire, in the creatively
titled third book, Squire. In this
one, we see Kel grow up over the four years of her squire training, and blossom
under Raoul’s mentorship. He trains her for command, refuses to accept that she
is any less of a knight-in-training than anyone else, and eventually gives her
a post of command in the King’s Own when they ride off into war. Oh, and he
encourages her to enter tournaments, where she does quite well, thus giving the
people an example of what a lady knight can be.

But mostly, through all of this, the story shows us Kel
working hard. Her compassionate heart gets her into as much trouble as it does
grace, and the third book sees her trying to learn how and when to be
compassionate, and how to champion the small without killing herself. It’s an
important lesson for all of us to learn, but it’s doubly endearing because Kel
learns it so begrudgingly. She genuinely likes helping people. And that’s kind
of the best image she could have.

In the final book, Lady
Knight, Kel has finally become a knight, only the second woman to do so in
hundreds of years. She’s finally gotten to meet Alanna, and have Alanna tell
her that she could think of no better successor (which is awesome), and she’s
been given her own shield and commission. Unfortunately, Kel finds that her new
role in the kingdom is not on the front lines of the battlefield, but rather as
the commander of a refugee camp, caring for those whose homes were destroyed by
the war.

While Kel longs to see battle and have a hand in the fight,
she finds herself arguing about barracks placements, placating townsfolk, and
running patrols. She hates it. But. She can’t help loving the people, even when
they annoy her, and feeling responsible for them. So when the enemy attacks,
using black magic killing machines to kidnap her people, Kel forsakes her
hard-won knighthood, deserts her post, leads a rag-tag crew of renegades deep
into enemy country, and brings them back. She also kind of turns the tide of
the war and nearly gets executed. It’s the little things.

When the series ends, Kel is famed and noted as The
Protector of the Small. Her glory has spread throughout the land. The King has
pardoned her, and praised her. Even Lord Wyldon gives her a rousing praise for
her actions. And then, Kel goes home. To her command. At the refugee camp.

She doesn’t ride out into the sunset to complete even
greater feats of daring and strength. She doesn’t take command of the army or
serve as the King’s personal knight. She doesn’t even really get a reward. She
just goes home, back to her people, the ones she saved, and keeps doing her
thing.

That, more than anything, is why Kel is an important
character. Because we can’t all be Alanna, the special wonderful amazing one
who blows everyone away and becomes the King’s Champion because she brought
home the famed Dominion Jewel and also is perfect (aside from that nasty
temper). Alanna is the exception. Kel? Kel is the rule.

Kel succeeds because she tries. And not because she “believes
in herself” in some silly Disney movie sense. She works very, very hard to
achieve her goals. She doesn’t kid herself that it will be easy. And when she
faces setbacks, she just decides to work harder.

Kel is the one who proves that girls have just as much right
to be knights as boys, because she does it the same way the boys do. And, she
does it without giving up her femininity. She wears dresses, has a boyfriend
(in book three), and goes through an awkward and embarrassing puberty. Kel is
normal, and that’s what makes her great.

So, remember Kel. Whenever you feel like your obstacles are
insurmountable, or that the world demands something more of you than you can
give. I’m not saying it’s easy. Kel certainly would never say that. But that
doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try.